Are the pro-Hamas protests in violation of Canada’s hate speech and terrorism laws?

From the MacDonald Laurier Institute

By Joe Adam George

Regardless of how one feels about free speech, pro-Hamas protests have revealed some hidden, uncomfortable truths about many of our fellow Canadians

Rallies blocking traffic at major intersections. Protestors intimidating businesses and community centres. Radicalized student unions paralyzing college and university campuses. Hateful and incendiary messages dominating social media. Pro-Palestine agitators ripping down posters of hostages and waving the flags of banned terrorist organizations like Hamas and Taliban.

These sustained public acts of malice – specifically targeting Israel and the Jewish community –have become the new norm in Canada in the aftermath of the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks that Hamas, a listed foreign terrorist organization in Canada, committed against 1,400 unsuspecting civilians in Israel, in addition to taking over 240 hostages. Calls for a global “Day of Jihad” and similar rabble-rousing by Hamas sympathizers and pro-Palestine groups have only added fuel to the raging fire.

Invigorated by the brutal events of that fateful day, a populist, mostly Muslim Arab faction, has found a “solidarity ally” in the radical left – a rather odd symbiosis given these groups have very little in common (barring of course, their mutual sadistic hatred of Jews and desire to see the annihilation of Israel). Their oft-frightful vituperations, which include ostensible acts of glorifying terrorism, antisemitism, and intimidation of Jews (a protected minority community in Canada) has left many mild-mannered Canadians aghast, drawing parallels with Kristallnacht (a wave of coordinated pogroms that took place 85 years ago in Nazi Germany and its annexed territories).

From leftist students cheering for “intifada” (violent resistance) and branding Hamas terrorists as “martyrs”, to multiple instances of arson, shootings, assault, death threats and calls for the boycotting of Jewish-owned businesses, the last few weeks have been a living nightmare for Canadian Jews as they continue to be inundated with vitriol in the streets and on social media.

Much ink has been spilled debating whether these acts and their perpetrators are in violation of Canada’s hate speech and terrorism laws, considering that Canadians (Jewish and non-Jewish alike) are quickly becoming accustomed to seeing blatant expressions of antisemitism and hatred on a daily basis.

Do flying Hamas and Taliban flags cross a line of criminality into “supporting” a listed terrorist entity? Can the infamous “machine gun earrings lady” be prosecuted for glorifying and promoting terrorism for publicly singing the praises of the Hamas terrorists? Should the former Carleton University economics professor who tweeted that Israelis brought the horrific events of Oct. 7 “on themselves” be charged for hate speech? Can the actions of the protestors who targeted and harassed Jewish coffee shops and delis in Toronto be construed as the “public incitement of hatred”? Could those who chant the unambiguously genocidal slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” be viewed as “advocating genocide”?

The answer to all these questions is a likely “no”.

Josh DeHaas, counsel with the Canadian Constitution Foundation, told me in an interview last week that Canada’s existing hate speech laws are poorly understood by many. Moreover, he pointed out that the recent explosion of vitriol caused by the Israel-Hamas conflict is “a new phenomenon” not just for regular Canadians, but also for the law enforcement agencies grappling with the unprecedented wave of vitriol.

“They have their work cut out for them because hatred is a notoriously difficult concept to define,” DeHaas said. “We know the bar for criminal hate speech in Canada is very high but, despite multiple court decisions discussing hate speech, we still don’t know exactly how high”.

“If you look at Twitter, you’ll quickly see that what counts as hateful is in the eye of the beholder. Feminists who advocate against wearing hijabs are often accused of engaging in hateful conduct against Muslims; but, to those feminists, advocating that women must or should wear hijabs is hateful towards women,” DeHaas explained. “Another example comes from the debate over whether transgender women should be in certain spaces—both sides accuse the other side regularly of engaging in hate speech. It’s unlikely this is illegal in Canada but it’s hard for regular people to know.”

“This difficulty with defining hatred leads to a chilling effect, since people fearing they will cross the line into criminality are worried about saying anything controversial. And that’s a huge problem for freedom of expression, since the purpose of freedom of expression is to allow for controversial ideas to be debated, and we can’t debate these things if people are afraid to speak,” he added.

“The subjective nature of what counts as hatred is one of the reasons why we at the Canadian Constitution Foundation are wary of legal restrictions on speech,” explained DeHaas. “That said, the Supreme Court of Canada has stated that hatred can be outlawed if it’s limited to those extreme manifestations of the emotion as described by the words ‘detestation’ and ‘vilification’.”

DeHaas cited the example of the 2013 R v Whatcott case, wherein then-Justice Marshall Rothstein of the Supreme Court offered some guidance on when speech will cross the line from merely offensive or humiliating into something that warrants placing a “reasonable limit” on freedom of expression. Criminal hate speech, wrote Justice Rothstein in the decision, includes “representations that expose a target group to detestation tend to inspire enmity and extreme ill-will against them, which goes beyond mere disdain or dislike.”

Justice Rothstein added that such outlawed speech may be identified by looking for the “hallmarks of hatred.” This may include “vilify(ing) the targeted group by blaming its members for the current problems in society, alleging that they are a powerful menace, arguing that they are carrying out secret conspiracies to gain global control or plotting to destroy western civilizations, saying that they are a parasitic race, liars, cheats, criminals or thugs, genetically inferior, lesser beasts, or sub-human filth.”

“‘Hatred’ is objectively defined so it is not supposed to matter whether an individual found the speech or tweet hateful,” DeHaas explained. “What is supposed to matter is whether a reasonable person, aware of the context and circumstances surrounding the expression, would view it as exposing the protected group – for example, Jews and people of Israeli origin – to hatred by others.”

“According to the Court, hate speech laws aren’t meant to censor; they’re meant to prevent harm that can result from exposing a group to hatred, which, in the Court’s view, can lead to exclusion of members of the group from society or even worse consequences like the Holocaust,” he added. “However, it’s still very difficult to know exactly where the line between merely offensive speech, which is legal, and speech that counts as the most extreme forms of vilification and detestation, which can land a person in prison.”

While Section 319 (2) of the Criminal Code is the main hate speech provision outlawing “wilful promotion of hatred”, charges and convictions under this section are relatively rare. Section 319 (2.1) is a new and untested provision specifically targeting antisemitism. Passed by Parliament just last year, it prohibits any individual or group from “communicating statements, other than in private conversation, [that] wilfully promotes antisemitism by condoning, denying or downplaying the Holocaust”. Both offences carry a two-year term of imprisonment.

Another relevant statute, Section 318 (1), carries a five-year prison sentence for anyone “advocating or promoting genocide”, defined as: “committing with intent to destroy in whole or in part any identifiable group [by] killing members of the group or deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction”.

DeHaas said the comments made by Montreal-based Imam Adil Charkaoui to a crowd on Oct. 28, which have been translated online as “Allah, destroy the arrogant Zionists…Allah, count every one of them, and kill them all, and do not exempt even one of them” may have breached Section 318 (1). That will likely depend on whether “Zionists” counts as a section of the public distinguished by race, religion or national or ethnic origin, he added.

This stated, DeHaas also cautioned that individuals have rarely been charged or convicted under any of the three hate crime statutes mentioned above as they all have high legal bars for prosecutors to prove criminal intent beyond a reasonable doubt. Besides, these offences are also unusual in the sense that they require the Attorney General of the province where the alleged offense took place to sign off before prosecution. (DeHaas noted that the police, not the Crown, lay charges in the case of most criminal offenses).

In addition to these provisions, any criminal offence that is motivated by hatred (e.g., assault, criminal harassment) can have the aggravated hate charge applied, possibly leading to a harsher sentence in the case of a conviction. For example, Calgary police charged a protester last week with “uttering threats” against two Jewish community organizations. Toronto Police, meanwhile, have pressed charges against a man who allegedly assaulted a person affixing pro-Israel posters to a utility pole. Both men, if convicted, could receive a tougher sentence if found to have been motivated by hatred.

Some lawyers have raised the possibility that those who publicly voice support for Hamas could be charged under Section 83 of the Criminal Code, which prohibits promoting terrorist activity. For example, some have suggested that the “machine gun earrings lady” (identified in media reports as Essra Karam) can be charged under Section 83 for saying “I support Hamas” and calling Hamas terrorists “true fighters” in an interview with The Rebel’s David Menzies.

DeHaas, who stresses that he is not an expert in terrorism laws, is nonetheless skeptical that merely stating support for a listed terrorist group, as this woman has clearly done, would violate the terrorism provisions of the Criminal Code.

“However, I do think it would be appropriate for authorities to investigate whether she is supporting Hamas in a more material sense by fundraising or recruiting for Hamas at the rally, because that is clearly illegal, and if she is not a Canadian citizen, it is possible that she could be inadmissible to Canada under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act”, DeHaas added.

Dan Stanton, Director of the National Security Program at the University of Ottawa and a former Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) manager, agreed with DeHaas’ assessment and on that same note, expressed bewilderment at how dangerous and unreformed jihadists like Montreal’s Charkaoui could acquire full Canadian citizenship and walk around freely spewing hate; especially given his criminal track record, which includes stints in prison for alleged al-Qaeda ties and promoting radical Islam with the goal of exhorting people to go overseas to join terror groups.

Stanton also raised a worrying point – the pro-Hamas rallies and demonstrations are likely to have radicalized and galvanized certain left-wing and Islamic extremists, which could potentially pose a serious threat to the national security of Canada and its allies, should these individuals conduct lone-wolf attacks, fundraise, recruit or travel abroad to participate in overseas conflicts.

Since its vicious attack on Israel, Hamas has made its aspirations to create a “global Islamic caliphate” quite clear. It is little wonder why Hamas is viewed as “the new ISIS” – an observation FBI Director Christopher Wray made during his testimony before the U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee late last month, telling the Committee, “We assess that the actions of Hamas and its allies will serve as an inspiration, the likes of which we haven’t seen since ISIS launched its so-called caliphate several years ago”.

This warning should be taken seriously by the Trudeau government as, unlike in Europe, where terror attacks have generally been carried out by refugees or illegal immigrants, Canada’s most serious threats are likely to come from radicalized homegrown extremists. However, Phil Gurski, a former senior strategic terrorism analyst with CSIS, said the Trudeau government’s inept handling of the conflict and general apathy towards its imperiled Jewish community proves it hasn’t learned from its recent experiences with Chinese and (alleged) Indian interference and, instead, continues to prioritize vote-bank politics over Canada’s national security and longstanding ties with Israel.

So, what does all this mean for Canada’s Jews and other Canadians? Do they continue to put up with these despicable acts of vitriol and violence and wait until someone is grievously hurt or killed like the 69-year-old Jewish man in Los Angeles?

Both Gurski and Stanton remarked that the top priority for law enforcement agencies and all levels of government should be to reassure Jewish communities by taking meaningful preventive measures to ensure their safety and security. They added that CSIS is likely to be tracking suspicious individuals and extremists who were already under the scanner, and also investigating for clues that indicate any fundraising or recruitment activities being conducted by Hamas, Hezbollah and ISIS sympathizers in Canada.

At a campaign reception in Minnesota last week, U.S. President Joe Biden said rather profoundly: “You know, about every six, eight generations, we go through a phenomenal change. What happens in the next two, three, four years is going to determine what the next four or five decades are going to look like.”

Regardless of how one feels about free speech and the hate crime statutes, the pro-Hamas protests have revealed some hidden, uncomfortable truths about many of our fellow Canadians – their blind hatred of Jews and contempt for law and order, historical facts (pertaining to the Israel-Palestine conflict), and western values and principles. Undeniably, the ancient evil of antisemitism poses an existential threat to Canadian values, unity and security but we can remain optimistic that these violent protests would serve as the inflection point Canada desperately needs to dismantle such deep-rooted, hideous ideologies and the systems that perpetuate them; which would determine if its long-term future remains in the civilized world or with those who lionize the women-raping and baby-killing barbarians of Hamas.

Joe Adam George is a former foreign policy and national security research intern with the Washington, D.C.-based policy think tank, Hudson Institute, and a communications strategist.

Related Topics:#FreeSpeech #GlobalDayOfJihad #HateSpeechLaws #JoeAdamGeorge #MacdonaldLaurierInstitute #TerrorismLaws

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British Columbia will talk about Donald Trump’s tariffs in 2026, and it will keep grinding through affordability. But the issue that will decide whether the province can build, invest, and govern is land use.

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In August 2025, the Cowichan ruling turned that unease into a live wire. The court recognized the Cowichan’s Aboriginal title over roughly 800 acres within Richmond, including lands held by governments and unnamed third parties. It found that grants of fee simple and other interests unjustifiably infringed that title, and declared certain Canada and Richmond titles and interests “defective and invalid,” with those invalidity declarations suspended for 18 months to give governments time to make arrangements.

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Canada Lets Child-Porn Offenders Off Easy While Targeting Bible Believers

Published on December 18, 2025

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Judges struck down one-year minimum prison sentences for child pornography possession. Meanwhile, the chair of the Parliamentary Human Rights Committee publicly stated that religious scriptures condemning homosexuality are “hateful.” Lee Harding says the 1982 Charter has led to an inversion of Canadian values.

Light sentences for child-porn possession collide with federal signals that biblical texts could be prosecuted as hate

Was Canada’s 1982 Charter meant to condemn the Bible as hate literature or to weaken sentencing for child pornography? Like it or not, that is the direction post-Charter Canada is moving.

For Halloween, the black-robed justices at the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that a one-year mandatory sentence for accessing or possessing child sexual abuse materials amounted to “cruel and unusual punishment.” The judgment upheld a similar ruling from the Quebec Court of Appeal.

A narrow 5-4 majority leaned on a hypothetical. If an 18-year-old received a sexually explicit image from a 17-year-old girlfriend, that image would technically be child porn. If prosecuted, the recipient could face a one-year minimum sentence. On that basis, the judges rejected the entire minimum sentence law.

But the real case before them was far more disturbing. Two Quebec men possessed images and videos that were clearly the result of abuse. One had 317 unique images of child porn, with 90 per cent showing girls aged three to six years old forced into penetration and sodomy by adults or other minors. The other had 531 images and 274 videos of girls aged five to 10 engaged in sexual acts, including anal and vaginal penetration and, in some cases, multiple children.

The sentences were light. The first offender received 90 days of intermittent imprisonment, served concurrently, plus 24 months of probation. The second received nine months of imprisonment and the same probation period. How is this acceptable?

The judgment did not emerge without warning. Daniel A. Lang, a Liberal campaign chair appointed to the Senate by Lester B. Pearson, saw this coming more than 40 years ago. On April 23, 1981, he expressed concerns that the new Constitution could be used to erode basic decency laws. He pointed to the U.S. experience and predicted that Canada could face a wave of cases challenging laws on “obscenity, pornography and freedom of speech,” leading to the “negation of federal or provincial legislation.”

His warning has come true. If Parliament wants to restore mandatory minimum sentences, it can do so by passing a new law that removes the obscure scenario judges used to strike them down. Section 33, the notwithstanding clause, gives elected officials the power to override court rulings for up to five years at a time.

This reflects Canada’s own system. In the British tradition Canada inherited, Parliament—not the courts—is the ultimate authority. British common law developed over centuries through conventions and precedents shaped by elected lawmakers. Section 33 protects that balance by ensuring Parliament can still act when judges disagree.

There is a democratic check as well. If a government uses Section 33 and voters believe it made the wrong call, they can remove that government at the next election. A new government can then follow the judges’ views or let the old law expire after five years. That accountability is precisely why Section 33 strengthens democracy rather than weakening it.

Yet today, Ottawa is working to limit that safeguard. In September, the Carney Liberals asked the Supreme Court to rule on new limits to how legislatures can use Section 33. Five premiers wrote to Carney to oppose the move. Former Newfoundland and Labrador premier Brian Peckford, the last living signatory to the agreement that produced the 1982 Constitution Act, has also condemned the attempt as wrongful.

The judges will likely approve the new limits. Why would they refuse a chance to narrow the one tool elected governments have to get around their rulings? For decades, the Supreme Court has made a habit of striking down laws, telling Parliament it is wrong and forcing political change.

And while minimum sentences for child-porn offenders fall, the Carney cabinet is focused on something else entirely: prosecuting Bible believers for alleged hate.

The quiet part was said out loud by Montreal lawyer Marc Miller, former minister of immigration and citizenship and chair of the Parliamentary Human Rights Committee. On Oct. 30, he told the committee, “In Leviticus, Deuteronomy, Romans, there’s other passages, there’s clear hatred towards, for example, homosexuals.”

The former minister added, “There should perhaps be discretion for prosecutors to press charges … [T]here are clearly passages in religious texts that are clearly hateful.”

That is the former minister’s view. Instead of Bible thumpers, we now have Charter thumpers who use their “sacred” document to justify whatever interpretation suits their cause and wield it against their ideological opponents. When wokeness hardens into dogma, disagreement becomes heresy. And we know what happens to heretics.

A country that lets child-porn offenders off easy while it hunts down Bible believers for fines and possible prison has lost its way. Most Canadians would reject this trade-off, but their rulers do not, whether in cabinet or on the judges’ bench. A dark shadow is settling over the country.

Lee Harding is a research fellow for the Frontier Centre for Public Policy